Indie Impressions - Cosmochoria

 Cosmochoria

Now Available on Steam Early Access

Developed by Nate Schmold

 

Cosmochoria tells the off-the-wall story of a lone astronaut, equipped curiously with nothing but his trusty laser pistol and space helmet. No, seriously, that's all, this dude is completely naked. Not much is known about our naked astro-protagonist other than his mission to bring color and life to a dying galaxy randomly sprinkled with lifeless planets. You'll jetpack around in classic arcade fashion pew-pew-pewing all that stand in your way as you rocket between the rocky spheres in an effort to rescue these planets from bleakness.

Your early career as a cosmic space horticulturist will be painstakingly difficult and a bit of a slow start. The game starts you off with the core essentials and not much else, including a basic jetpack for floating between planets, a puny peashooter and just enough seed to get you started with your first plant of each run. The planets start off barren and empty but as you fertilize them with your psychedelic plants become more and more cosmic and groovy.

With each anomaly you plant a new wave of enemies approaches and you're faced with defending yourself while managing to plant more in the process. The further you get and the more you plant, the more intense and difficult the enemy waves get forcing you to skip and jump over shots and fight back the small alien creatures dropped by UFOs.

Luckily, filling a planet with enough funky space plants to fill the empty heart at the core means you've accomplished reviving it, and the planet gives back its lifeforce to your missing health as some strange act of gratitude. This lengthens your lifespan giving you a chance to collect the dropped gems from enemies used for buying new equipment or items between plays.

The equipment you accumulate through your many playthroughs are what take Cosmochoria from being just a fun arcade romp to a fully addictive and almost roguelike experience with persistent elements that expand on the length of each trip. You'll find permanent upgrades for everything from maximum health, speed of your character, to the amount of starting seeds you bring with you at the beginning and all will help push you on your journey to discovering the secrets of Cosmochorias world.

The world is chock full of secrets to discover, and given the randomized nature of the game will appear at the least expected of times and runs. These secrets are obviously.. a bit secret so I don't want to spoil them but can come in the form of anything from strange and mysterious turds to ancient space eggs. Their usage is generally as cryptic as the item itself, and usually involves finding another oddball character in the galaxy to bring the item to.

The rewards you gain from these strange, cryptic, and secret side quests randomly sprinkled across this colorful cosmos are extremely worth the trip and usually give you permanent upgrades that will carry over and speed up your future endeavors into this trippy realm.

Cosmochoria makes me feel like a kid on Saturday morning again, the oddly nostalgic twinklings of the opening song evoke a melancholy feeling in me that is both very happy and at the same time a bit sad. The memories of childhoods filled with imagination and creativity seem so close to us in our minds, but are also far in the past and unreachable in our adult lives.

Maybe this is the point behind Cosmochoria? To remind us that even though we're adults, the world isn't so bleak, that we can still escape to worlds inside our minds the same way we did as children and forget the troubles of reality and really expand our imagination even during the mind-numbing process of growing older. This is a game without a demographic, for anyone and everyone to enjoy, it's a showcase of the kind of creativity and imagination games can and should have, and the only requirement is that you have a serious passion for fun.

Cosmochoria is an incredibly fun and addictive journey into a fantastically colorful world of cosmic entities.Filling each planet and watching them transform is addictive to me in the same way watching your ball in Katamari Damacy fill with the trinkets and relics of the world you roll up around you was. It's very accessible in its arcade-like execution and controls, but retains the high skill ceiling of a roguelike that keeps you pressing on to find what you need to increase your survivability in future plays.

It's the kind of game you can pick up and play for a few minutes, or get lost in and obsess over upgrades and collectibles for hours on end. Not only is it just plain damn fun, but it features a stylish world with a unique cast of characters and monsters that I won't ever forget in the same way I never forget the cartoons or picture books that shaped my childhood. Yes, Cosmochoria is that kind of an experience.

Indie Impressions - Neverending Nightmares

Neverending Nightmares

Now Available on Steam

Developed by Infinitap Games

The greatest and most effective aspect of horror is the tension and the atmosphere, the feeling of creeping unknown terror that lurks around each corner ahead, the mysterious buzzing sounds of some vile machine sprinkled with the curious moanings of what one could only guess are tortured souls.

When it comes to horror, it's hardly ever the execution of cheap scares or the appearance of the actual monster that are scary or make the experience, but the thick and heavy atmosphere and the suspense that it builds in you throughout the journey and this is exactly where Neverending Nightmares excels above and beyond everything I have come to expect from the horror genre.

Neverending Nightmares tells its chilling story of endless terror in the heart of a young boy through brilliantly gritty black and white artwork that evokes a strong nostalgia in me for the works of Edward Gorey, and the influence is obviously strong both in visuals and narrative content. This mysterious story of a troubled young protagonist shows a deep connection between him and his sister, and yet he seems to be so alone, so isolated in this nightmare realm.

The effects of prolonged solitude and isolation can bring about these strange and hard to manage feelings of anxiety or OCD, and it creates a feeling of fear and distrust towards the few humans that are close to the inflicted. We see this fear in the protagonist and his close relationship with his sister as his visions slowly distort the image of this caring force in his life into someone who doesn't even recognize who he is.

The title screen alone gives a foreboding and chilling effect as the eerie sounding notes of a piano descend peculiarly in the same way the player will descend into progressively bizarre and terrifying realms of what seems to be the characters own mind. Deeper into the hauntings of your nightmares you will journey, waking up over and over again only to find yourself in an even more terrifying nightmare than the last like some kind of harrowing metaphor for the day-to-day dealings of those who suffer from mental health issues.

With each passing of these horrible nights that seem to be a dream or vision our protagonist awakens back in his bed suddenly, gasping for air and trying to put together the pieces of what he saw. Each time you awaken startled out from your slumber your environments change and the place you once called home slowly evolves into something hellish and terrifying. More and more with each damning vision your surroundings become enshrouded with antique oddities and bizzare, grotesque imagery.

I'm not the biggest fan of horror, not because I get scared easily but because blood and gore never really do it for me. I was kinda exposed to a lot of violent entertainment as a kid unfortunately and saw a lot of thriller and slasher flicks and such at probably too early an age.  I became totally desensitized to shock values in horror.

This game, though.. This effects me in ways I can't really explain, and wouldn't feel comfortable explaining because it really hits home with issues I've had dealing with insomnia and anxiety at a younger age although clearly not as extreme as what the developer, who states that his own real life experiences were a huge influence on the game, has been through. The point, either way, seems to be that mental health, no matter how small or severe, is a real issue that needs to be looked at more seriously especially in the gaming world.

Despite the very sparse dialogue the characters are given incredible authentic personality through the emotions they portray throughout the game. The sound design is the best I've heard in a horror game and recommends you use headphones, I can see exactly why and would absolutely recommend it now as well. The effects all come at you from every direction and make you feel like footsteps accompanied by the rattling of chains are closing in behind and faint whispering can be heard as you step deeper into dark basements, the atmosphere is so thick and heavy that I find myself stopping to catch my breath and gather my thoughts.

Still, after a couple playthroughs and seeing half of the endings I am left with so many question on what exactly our main character is going through. What causes him to see some of these visions, particularly of the cruel happenings between him and his sister? Which of these events are reality, and which are merely a figment of his paranoid and anxious mind?

This is a story I will revisit and contemplate many times, and it's a story I'll be determined to show everyone I know with or without an interest in the subject matter of mental health. Neverending Nightmares manages to be genuinely terrifying and surpasses even the most realistic 3D horror experiences on PC simply through the usage of skin-tingling atmosphere and an art style that won't soon be forgotten.

Indie Impressions - Roundabout

Roundabout

Now Available on Steam

Developed by No Goblin 

Most of us who game have been gaming a super long time by now, and anyone who's been around can tell that ideas are slowly running dry. Innovation is something more or less absent from the game industry as we see the market pump out bland shooters, uninspired retro platformers, Diablo-likes, or roguelike-likes sticking with elements they know sell while struggling to find ideas that haven't been exhausted already.

Every great once and awhile a game comes a long and changes everything capturing the hearts of players everywhere by simply presenting us with a mechanic so strange and simple yet is an absolute blast to play. A game that makes the player stop and ask "Why hasn't anyone thought of this before?"

Roundabout is unlike any other game I've played, utilizing a concept more original since the world was graced with the likes of Katamari Damacy and its genre bending gameplay and definitely channeling that same spirit of creativity and imagination. The humorous 70's B-movie story of Georgios' epic rise to becoming the worlds most famous rotating limousine driver is told through the campaigns many quick narrative driven missions. Each twist of the story brings you to different locations on the map, with key events being triggered by large yellow exclamation points that are just as tricky to get to as the missions are to complete.

For such an out there and crazy concept Roundabout works incredibly well and plays like a dream with the swift and responsive controls of a rotating object through maze-like obstacles that is slightly reminiscent of the overlooked classic Kurukuru Kururin which spent more time in my GBA than probably any other game available for the system. Roundabout takes this concept of quick wit and extreme navigational skill to the next level, applying the quirky but obsessively fun sport of spinning to a GTA style sandbox world with an impressive map that you are free to explore at your leisure.

Don't feel like continuing the campaign? Tackle some side missions or test your skill against the world with some speedruns. Don't feel like pushing your rotating skills to the test and just want to relax? Take a spin around town and use your hard earned cash to buy various property, upgrades, and cosmetics in the form of hats and new horns! The choice is really yours, Roundabout is a sandbox with tons of possibilities offering open ended free-roam gameplay with a rotating twist that anyone can hop right into.

You'll spin your way through bright and sunny suburbs, crowded streets of the city, all the way to the snowy outskirts of the countryside all in a hilarious and dramatic journey to face down your ultimate rival and take back the title as the best spinning driver around. Finding your way to events is almost as much fun as the events themselves as you fight to go with the flow and use the rotation in your favor, bumping and crashing into everything in the process. You'll be whipping around in circles bringing your colorful cast of customers to their designated drop-off points in the fastest possible time like some sort of tweaked out Crazy Taxi.. Crazy Limo?

Roundabout has a seriously great sense of humor and tells its B-movie story in the best way possible; FMVs. Those not familiar with the long lost form of pop-culture might find this aspect of the game to be cringe-worthy, but as an old school fan of the likes of Tex Murphy, Bad Mojo, and Night Trap the style satisfies every nostalgic craving perfectly and even exceeded all of my expectations of what sort of imagery campy yet memorable FMVs are capable of.

You don't have to be a fan of FMVs to fall in love with Roundabout, though. It's a game that bursts with a style of its own, a game by people with a great sense of humor targeted towards those who don't take themselves too seriously. Its addictive and accessible obstacle course rotating action set to only the grooviest of tunes and the spiffiest of visuals. Roundabout comes from a history of quality game making, and has nothing but love put into its collaboration, making this one hell of an entertaining trip.

Danny wants YOU to play Roundabout.

Indie Impressions - Iron Fisticle

Iron Fisticle

Now Available on Steam

Developed by Curve Studios

Long before the likes of Geometry Wars or Waves, twin stick shooting gameplay has been re-imagined countless times since the 80's first gave us classics like Robotron or Berzerk. Introducing the directional shooting and arena based challenges was the start of a new genre, and soon we saw deeper level progression in the form of dungeon crawlers like Gauntlet or SMASH T.V. Iron Fisticle seeks to bring modern twin-stick action and 80's arcade arena shooting into a classic RPG setting of medieval madness.

Iron Fisticle stays true to the classic formula with the original 8-directional shooting we remember from the best of arcade classics while adding its own brand of modern flashiness through crisp and highly stylized pixel art provided by the ever talented Tikipod of Aqua Kitty fame. The game spices up the basic high-score arena shooting gameplay with a few elements of randomization and persistence giving roguelike depth to a generally simple arcade concept.

The dungeons are laid out in a grid starting you in one corner and the boss in the other, with layouts being randomized each trip. Defeating any given room leaves you faced with the decision of which direction to travel in, taking into consideration upgrades and power-ups needed along the way to properly defeat the bullet-hell action of each of the four floor bosses. Different routes will provide you with either a shop for upgrades or a platforming mini game for earning coins, and sufficiently powering up your character along the way is vital before facing any of the floors bosses.

Even though the game stays mostly true to the shoot-'em-up roots of SMASH T.V. it includes the addictive properties of an RPG or roguelike. You also occasionally come across permanent upgrades that carry over on consecutive play throughs, which raise any particular stat and is where the persistence comes from. These are very valuable, making future trips into the dungeon much more manageable and high scores more obtainable for diligent explorers who are keen to find and collect a good amount of upgrades.

Aside from the stat modifying upgrades you find are weapons you can gain from leveling up, and the selection is impressive. From walls of throwing daggers, streams of blue flamethrowers, to rows of area effecting bombs there's plenty reason to keep playing and discover all of the devastating ways you can end your foes and rush through the levels even faster than before. Despite having beat the game, I still find new tools to play around with each time that make me re-evaluate how I could tackle it again.

Iron Fisticle is retro done right and a dream come true for score chasers. The adrenaline gives you an arcade high as you make a mad dash around each room collecting the pixelated food that drops to keep your multiplier going and test your skill against the world on the leaderboards. Even though a single play through can be experienced in one sitting, its the kind of game you'll want to visit often just to see how much better you can do the same way many of us revisit our favorite arcade classics.

With a solid brand of arcade-y twin-stick chaos chock-full of addictive RPG properties that push you towards multiple plays, excellent couch co-op, a heavy and groovy chiptune soundtrack complimenting crisp and attractive pixel art visuals all rolled into one package Iron Fisticle is one nostalgic experience that is hard to pass up.

Early Access Preview - Vector Thrust

Vector Thrust

Developed by TimeSymmetry Publishing by Iceberg Interactive 

Now Available on Steam Early Access

Flight simulators are something I haven't been able to get into for many years, not since the earlier days of console flight combat when there were fun and less complicated arcade action experiences that focused more on intense combat than technical realism.

Vector Thrust is the only of its kind in a long while to grab my attention and keep me plowing through the campaign obsessively the same way I did all those years ago, marathoning rental copies of Ace Combat for hours through late summer nights off from school.

In production for over two long years of dedicated development, Vector Thrust has already found a loyal fanbase of people such as myself who have been yearning for a lost aerial combat experience that is easy enough to hop into for all skill levels while still challenging enough to encourage thorough practice and countless heated retries in arcade spirit. Vector Thrust is a one of a kind aerial combat title that excels where the bigger companies have failed recently in delivering open dogfighting action that manages to keep me wanting to play through objectives over and over due to being just plain entertaining without the filler of modern games.

The game presents an ass kicking soundtrack as well as a slick cell-shaded style that while not exactly realistic gives a polished and stylish appearance to the explosive imagery of combat. Though it may not be a popular choice, it stands out and gave me a certain nostalgia for the cell-shaded visuals in Robotech: Battlecry and similar arcade-y air combat titles of the PS2 era.

The two campaign are a work in progress but already feature sixteen action packed missions between them that showcase everything from intercepting bombers to bombing carriers out in the ocean. These cover the core types of objectives you'll be carrying out as the game is fleshed out during its Early Access period and the campaign is crafted into a complete story with a narrative.

The variety and accessibility of the missions keeps the modest length campaign engaging from beginning to end, ground assaults feel a little rough with not a lot of risk of being shot down as you descend to bomb them but air-to-air dogfights are exhilarating and incredibly well done. Air-to-air combat is intense and fast paced and the A.I. is cunning and deceptive in how it maneuvers out of your view and attempts to keep you in sight at all times.

Before embarking on any given mission you're given a selection of true to life aircraft and their respective weapons to consider when taking on specific tasks. The selection is already great ranging from heavy and slow A-10 bombers to quick and deadly F-15 fighters and each excel in their own unique way, requiring you to put some thought into what you bring with you into combat. The environments you take flight in are gorgeous setting that paint the perfect backdrop for an all-out war, ranging from the dusty sand dunes of deserts to the sunny islands of the tropics.

The challenge mode appears to be the real bread and butter of the game being where most of the hundreds of aircraft are unlocked in the expansive tree of increasingly powerful choices. Each plane unlocked is a new mission earned, leading to even more unlocks for a massive amount of content that is genuinely exciting to blast through. The challenges are quick craft-specific tests of reflex and skill that present you with a seemingly simple task but must be conquered in expert speed.

These challenges are generally straight forward enough to finish, but the real difficulty comes in learning how complete each one in quick enough time to earn yourself a decent enough grade to move on and earn your next fighter and its respective mission. Each of the challenges include both a local and online score board enticing the player to revisit each of the diabolical scenarios to test your ability and see how you fare against the rest of the world.

Vector Thrust has come a long way since its already electrifying early alpha and is already the perfect arcade combat sim for people who just want to jump into some action and shoot their opposition out of the sky. With the promise of a fleshed out narrative that dramatically pulls you into the action in classic Ace Combat fashion, a more fleshed out multiplayer experience, and heaps more content to an already huge roster of available airplanes and modes this is the number one air combat fix to keep an eye on right now.

Whether you're a thrill-seeking arcade action fan looking for that quick dogfight or a hardcore sim veteran with a love for realism looking for something different Vector Thrust is absolutely the most accessible fun you'll have in a game in the genre which says a lot given the indie status, small budget, and even smaller team and it can only get better on its way out of Early Access.

Indie Impressions - Velocibox

Velocibox

Now Available on Steam

Developed by Shawn Beck

With origins in the Ludum Dare game jams, Velocibox emerges from its roots as the most difficult and rewarding endless runner around.

Frustration is a feeling that when applied correctly can keep the player determined, and Velocibox is certainly a frustrating game. As frustrating as it is, why do I keep coming back for more? Despite my initial hundreds of deaths on the first level, despite hearing "Level 1, begin!" ring through my ears and haunting me in my sleep, I still keep loading up this punishing game every chance I get to push onwards. It's probably because every time I play I learn something new and get a little further with the end of my current best stage always just out reach. Patience is clearly a virtue as you take baby steps learning to surf along the four deadly sides of this flashy and minimal Velocibox.

Velocibox originated as a Ludum Dare game jam, and after high demand comes to Steam as the newest and hardest offering in the endless runner genre. This is the definition of "one more try!" gameplay, like some kind of super addictive fusion of Super Hexagon and the usual avoid-em-up action of an endless runner, the gameplay is super easy to get into but quickly ramps up into pure chaos making mastering the game a serious challenge.

Levels are generally short but that depends mostly on how fast you're picking up each of the floating cubes along the way, as you can drift along endlessly until the correct amount are obtained. Each of the sections all have a random factor to their composition and placement on any fresh start but always feature the same general patterns, requiring a bit of muscle memory to fully master each one. You'll die an innumerable amount of times learning these layouts and the lack of checkpoints will punish your every mistake dooming you to start anew with each failure.

Getting into the groove is a slow affair for newcomers as the player takes their time figuring out how to navigate the fast-paced walls and its obstacles. Once you've got a handle on how to flip the stage and grind along the sides with ease the game opens up a lot more, going from frustrating to outright addictive.

The player will apply these newly developed skills flipping and coasting across walls with finesse and elegance picking up the important orange cubes with diligence. As skills improve and orange cubes are picked up faster, your multiplier ascends at an alarming rate and you'll be burning right through each of the stages in a minimalistic Super Hexagon-esque blissout.

Velocibox requires persistence and a bit of patience, that's for damn sure, but if you're willing to dedicate a high level of focus you'll be rewarded with one of the most intense and refreshing pick-up-and-play experiences. This is a must for fans of quick and colorful arcade action who aren't discouraged by a fierce challenge.

Indie Impressions - Runers

Runers

Now Available on Steam (w/ Playable Demo)

Developed by Let's Get Kraken Games

In an industry popular for flashy visuals and over-the-top plots we tend to forget what makes the games that have lasted us the longest so memorable, their content and the feeling of discovery. Runers ditches the sugar-coating and filler of modern games in favor of pure content and customization to help craft an experience that revolves around how you want to play.

Banished to the confines of a dark and dank dungeon with nothing but your arcane knowledge and the magical power of the Runes found within. The moody melodies and grim dim-lit rooms beckon you deeper in to the randomly generated chambers of ongoing dungeon floors which each act as an arena, staging chaotic top-down battles and sometimes throwing objective based events at you for a chance at an additional skill to level up and increase your survivability in these diabolical crypts.

Runers is slightly rough around the edges in terms of aesthetics with its art and sound effects having a very hand-made and appropriately gritty quality to them. This is however not at all a bad thing and will actually be a welcome feeling among old-schoolers who remember the early days of PC gaming, as this has a very similar feel visually to the obscure titles of the early 90s many are fond of.

Runers features the grid-like map progression and dungeon exploration of the classic Zelda games with the fast-paced horde slaying arcade-action of a Gauntlet title. There's no drawn out plot or complicated goals present here, instead Runers takes a more score-attack oriented approach testing the players ability to survive and make the best usage of their findings. Most of your early runs will end swiftly in humiliating defeat, but the more adept of players will experiment and explore the hundreds of possibilities made available through Rune crafting and the spells it produces.

Runes come in the form of different varying elements, from slow burning Fire to Air spells with the ability to knockback. Combining the different spells can be done in pairs of two or three depending on the amount of combiners you have. Combining two spells is as simple as using a Rune Combiner which are generally dropped off of the tougher glowing Champion type enemies as well as mid-bosses.

In order to obtain the more useful and generally passive or evasive three-spell combinations you'll need to either defeat one of the main bosses or accumulate 4 regular Combiners. This provides an even deeper level of decision making forcing you to choose between going with the instant gratification of a slightly stronger 2nd level combo or saving your Combiners up for the often life saving 3rd level spells.

The easiest way to meet your maker is to become surrounded. The game features Diablo levels of swarming from your adversaries and the worst thing to do is get trapped in a corner or against a wall as you'll quickly be blocked in by swathes of dangerous creatures with no escape other than the sweet solace of your own magic-blasting runes making way. Although you'll be overwhelmed early on much of the time consecutive runs will last longer as you learn the necessities of preparation, especially prior to facing the hectic boss battles and their bullet-hell styled patterns.

The rune system is the bread and butter of the game, providing hundreds of unique and effective combinations of magical runes all with different attacks and properties. Throughout the levels you'll find differently sized rune combiners which will allow you to combine different runes into bigger, better attacks to use on your action bar.

The abilities gained from each combined spell are unknown at first and to unlock the hundreds of useful attacks you'll have to experiment with the different complex combinations. Runes can also be stacked onto powers in the ability bar that use similar elements, strengthening a particular attribute tied to it. In the end what you have is a very free-form combat system with an extremely high skill ceiling, the limits being that of your own discovery and persistence.

Runers is the most customizable encounter I've had in the action rogue-like genre, complimenting the play style of every attribute be it speed, power, or wit. It offers a level of creativity and choice in how you approach battles that is unseen for dungeon crawlers, and offers enough variation to always keep you coming back. For the modest asking price, Runers is an engrossing and addictive experience with an amount of content that surpasses anything of its kind.

Indie Impressions - Deep Under the Sky

Deep Under the Sky

Now Available on Steam

Developed by Northway Games and RichMakeGame

In the undiscovered recesses of a faraway planet, beautiful and strange organisms live and breathe in a psychedelic Venusian world of dancing lights and Metroid-like organisms. Similarly psychedelic to the visual style of the game is the soundtrack, with its equally as trippy and ambient qualities that build up and evolve with each successful move you make.

Deep Under the Sky uses a one-button control system that while incredibly easy to use is surprisingly deep in execution. The objective of each beautiful organic stage is to fertilize each glowing plant with the debris from the exploded amoeba-like jellyfish that release from the base you control. As simple as that sounds reaching each carefully placed plant and spreading your pieces far enough to fertilize them will be a matter of careful aiming and finesse as you surpass each obstacle and navigate each twist and turn of the maze-like passageways.

Releasing your little jellyfish and aiming their trajectory with split second perfection is a zen-like experience almost akin to a surrealistic and extra-terrestrial Skee-Ball, the game is all about accuracy. As the levels progress your jelly-like projectiles become faster and force you to think quicker about deciding when to employ your various maneuvers. Each tap of launch button you make and each skill you employ have a huge impact and consequence.

 You start out utilizing the simpler skills mostly involving rocketing your pieces in a specific direction, nudging it into the right direction when timed properly. As you move on more hazards and obstacles to work around are introduced and you're quickly navigating elaborate series of bounce pads to reach the proper destination.

By the second and third world you gain the ability to morph into a ball to roll across surfaces and gain momentum as you descend any hill. Timing the start and release of your ball form is incredibly important and adds even more reflex based timing. This feels really good, and again reminded me of some kind of psychedelic Skee-Ball or Pinball even more.

All the elements are present that make for yet another beautifully strange creation from the minds of gems Incredipede and Pineapple Smash Crew. If you're looking for a fun and simple way to relax with the added effect of being visually and audibly stunning then come and chill out Deep Under the Sky.